20.18.19
Letter
1876
Letter to Amanda Conner from Wilton School District #18 Treasurer Wightman and Envelope. Material: paper. (a) Letter. Size: 5" x 8". Description: white lined tablet paper dated Wilton, October 31, 1876 to Miss Amanda Conner. Message: I would like to enquire if you would like to take our school this winter, if you do please let us know by return mail, if you should like to take it give us your price. And Oblige, J. H. Wightman, Treasurer of Wilton School District No. 18.
Miss Amanda C. Conner of Blooming Grove and James Wilson (J.W.) Cleland were married October 3, 1877. Amanda was born September 11, 1852, in Indiana, and came to Waseca County with her parents in 1856. Sadie Lilly was a cousin of Amanda Conner on her mother's side. Mother Sarah Lilly Conner moved with her husband and family to South Dakota in 1883. She died there in 1900. Amanda's husband, J. W. Cleland was born September 27, 1847 in Delaware County, NY., and was one of nine children born to Rev. and Mrs. W. J. Cleland. He came West with his family in 1863. He carried on the homestead farm until 1885, when the place was sold and he purchased a small farm on the west shore of Clear Lake, near Waseca. J. W. was stricken by paralysis while working about a threshing machine. He never recovered from the stroke and died after a very prolonged illness, July 15, 1903.